The visual recognition problem is central to computer vision research. From robotics to information retrieval, many desired applications demand the ability to identify and localize categories, places, and objects. This tutorial overviews computer vision algorithms for visual object recognition and image classification. We introduce primary representations and learning approaches, with an emphasis on recent advances in the field. The target audience consists of researchers or students working in AI, robotics, or vision who would like to understand what methods and representations are available for these problems.

Clustering in high-dimensional spaces is nowadays a recurrent problem in many scientific domains but remains a difficult task from both the clustering accuracy and the result understanding points of view. This paper presents a discriminative latent mixture (DLM) model which fits the data in a latent orthonormal discriminative subspace with an intrinsic dimension lower than the dimension of the original space. By constraining model parameters within and between groups, a family of 12 parsimonious DLM models is exhibited which allows to fit onto various situations. An estimation algorithm, called the Fisher-EM algorithm, is also proposed for estimating both the mixture parameters and the discriminative subspace. Experiments on simulated and real datasets show that the proposed approach performs better than existing clustering methods while providing a useful representation of the clustered data. The method is as well applied to the clustering of mass spectrometry data.

The $\ell$-1 norm based optimization is widely used in signal processing, especially in recent compressed sensing theory. This paper studies the solution path of the $\ell$-1 norm penalized least-square problem, whose constrained form is known as Least Absolute Shrinkage and Selection Operator (LASSO). A solution path is the set of all the optimizers with respect to the evolution of the hyperparameter (Lagrange multiplier). The study of the solution path is of great significance in viewing and understanding the profile of the tradeoff between the approximation and regularization terms. If the solution path of a given problem is known, it can help us to find the optimal hyperparameter under a given criterion such as the Akaike Information Criterion. In this paper we present a sufficient condition on $\ell$-1 norm penalized least-square problem. Under this sufficient condition, the number of nonzero entries in the optimizer or solution vector increases monotonically when the hyperparameter decreases. We also generalize the result to the often used total variation case, where the $\ell$-1 norm is taken over the first order derivative of the solution vector. We prove that the proposed condition has intrinsic connections with the condition given by Donoho, et al \cite{Donoho08} and the positive cone condition by Efron {\it el al} \cite{Efron04}. However, the proposed condition does not need to assume the sparsity level of the signal as required by Donoho et al's condition, and is easier to verify than Efron, et al's positive cone condition when being used for practical applications.

We consider the problem of inferring the interactions between a set of N binary variables from the knowledge of their frequencies and pairwise correlations. The inference framework is based on the Hopfield model, a special case of the Ising model where the interaction matrix is defined through a set of patterns in the variable space, and is of rank much smaller than N. We show that Maximum Lik elihood inference is deeply related to Principal Component Analysis when the amp litude of the pattern components, xi, is negligible compared to N^1/2. Using techniques from statistical mechanics, we calculate the corrections to the patterns to the first order in xi/N^1/2. We stress that it is important to generalize the Hopfield model and include both attractive and repulsive patterns, to correctly infer networks with sparse and strong interactions. We present a simple geometrical criterion to decide how many attractive and repulsive patterns should be considered as a function of the sampling noise. We moreover discuss how many sampled configurations are required for a good inference, as a function of the system size, N and of the amplitude, xi. The inference approach is illustrated on synthetic and biological data.

New this year: Attendance at the tutorials is May 20, 2011.

Case-based reasoning (CBR) is a problem-solving process in which a new problem is solved by retrieving a similar situation and reusing its solution. Transfer learning occurs when, after gaining experience from learning how to solve source problems, the same learner exploits this experience to improve performance and/or learning on target problems. In transfer learning, the differences between the source and target problems characterize the transfer distance. CBR can support transfer learning methods in multiple ways. We illustrate how CBR and transfer learning interact and characterize three approaches for using CBR in transfer learning: (1) as a transfer learning method, (2) for problem learning, and (3) to transfer knowledge between sets of problems. We describe examples of these approaches from our own and related work and discuss applicable transfer distances for each. We close with conclusions and directions for future research applying CBR to transfer learning.

IEA / AIE-11 will be held June 28-July 4, 2011, in Syracuse, This page includes forthcoming AAAI sponsored conferences, conferences presented New York USA. by AAAI Affiliates, and conferences held in cooperation with AAAI. IE'11 will be held July 5-8, 2011 at Nottingham The Twenty-Fourth International Florida 2011 Robotics: Science and Systems AAAI Spring Symposium Series will be AI Research Society Conference. RSS 2011 will be held held March 21-23, 2011 in Stanford, Flairs-2011 will be held May 18-20, June 27-30, 2011, at the University of California. ICAPS 2011 will be held June 11-16, Artificial Intelligence. UAI 2011 will ICWSM-11 will be held in July 17-21 in 2011 in Freiburg, Germany.

This project describes the electricity demand and energy consumption management system and its application to Southern Peru smelter. It is composed of an hourly demand-forecasting module and of a simulation component for a plant electrical system. The first module was done using dynamic neural networks with backpropagation training algorithm; it is used to predict the electric power demanded every hour, with an error percentage below of 1%. This information allows efficient management of energy peak demands before this happen, distributing the raise of electric load to other hours or improving those equipments that increase the demand. The simulation module is based in advanced estimation techniques, such as: parametric estimation, neural network modeling, statistic regression and previously developed models, which simulates the electric behavior of the smelter plant. These modules facilitate electricity demand and consumption proper planning, because they allow knowing the behavior of the hourly demand and the consumption patterns of the plant, including the bill components, but also energy deficiencies and opportunities for improvement, based on analysis of information about equipments, processes and production plans, as well as maintenance programs. Finally the results of its application in Southern Peru smelter are presented.

Experiments in cognitive science and decision theory show that the ways in which people combine concepts and make decisions cannot be described by classical logic and probability theory. This has serious implications for applied disciplines such as information retrieval, artificial intelligence and robotics. Inspired by a mathematical formalism that generalizes quantum mechanics the authors have constructed a contextual framework for both concept representation and decision making, together with quantum models that are in strong alignment with experimental data. The results can be interpreted by assuming the existence in human thought of a double-layered structure, a 'classical logical thought' and a 'quantum conceptual thought', the latter being responsible of the above paradoxes and nonclassical effects. The presence of a quantum structure in cognition is relevant, for it shows that quantum mechanics provides not only a useful modeling tool for experimental data but also supplies a structural model for human and artificial thought processes. This approach has strong connections with theories formalizing meaning, such as semantic analysis, and has also a deep impact on computer science, information retrieval and artificial intelligence. More specifically, the links with information retrieval are discussed in this paper.

The mathematical formalism of quantum mechanics has been successfully employed in the last years to model situations in which the use of classical structures gives rise to problematical situations, and where typically quantum effects, such as 'contextuality' and 'entanglement', have been recognized. This 'Quantum Interaction Approach' is briefly reviewed in this paper focusing, in particular, on the quantum models that have been elaborated to describe how concepts combine in cognitive science, and on the ensuing identification of a quantum structure in human thought. We point out that these results provide interesting insights toward the development of a unified theory for meaning and knowledge formalization and representation. Then, we analyze the technological aspects and implications of our approach, and a particular attention is devoted to the connections with symbolic artificial intelligence, quantum computation and robotics.